Map of Scars
by Juniorstarcatcher
Summary: And after being assigned to tutor her in history, Finnick finally meets the girl everyone calls crazy Cresta. Modern AU.
1. Chapter 1

_"For you, who has suffered enough."_

* * *

><p>Everyone knows. After all, the concept of secrecy within a high school is more dated than the computers in the basement "technology" lab. So, it isn't a secret to anyone that she's crazy. Oh, no. The gossip-mongers who normally spread secrets like caked lip gloss exclusively amongst their own social circles make special exception for a case as spectacular as Annie's. The tales spun about her, some exaggerated, some understated, all perfectly crafted to breed a special kind of disdain for a girl whose only notable offense was being quiet and isolated, tromp across clique lines and smash social barriers until everyone, from the most infamous prom queen to the least notable punk, shudders when they hear her name called in class or whispered in passing through the hallway. If it isn't about the time she hummed through while taking an English exam, then it's about the time she spent the night in the library because she was too afraid to walk home in the rain.<p>

And because everyone thinks they know the character of Annie Cresta's mind, Finnick Odair receives the most pitying of displays when it's announced he will be tutoring her after school in history. The moment the statement crosses his teacher's lips, the entire classroom freezes, as if their spines were held in vices made of ice. Eyes, downcast and apologetic, turn to survey the man in question, penetrating his suddenly dumbstruck form.

"I'm sorry?" He asks, inclining his head forward as if he hadn't heard, when in reality, he heard but hopes on hope that he heard incorrectly.

The teacher wipes the chalk from her hands, leaving stains of white on her grey-knit pencil skirt, and smiles at the young man. Such a good young man, she thinks to herself, her aging features glowing as she looks at him. Such a good young man. Minds authority well. Represents the school as Head of the Student Council. Has set records and won medals in any athletic endeavor he's pursued. Yes. Such a good young man if there ever was one. Surely, this additional task wouldn't be too big a burden for him to shoulder.

"Annie Cresta. She's a Junior and needs some tutoring after being away from school for a family emergency," she clarifies.

All the air in the room seems to evaporate as people struggle to hold in their laughter at that blatant lie. _Family emergency_, indeed. The secrets of that lie are as well-known as any other Crazy Cresta story out there. About three weeks ago, she was eating lunch by herself when a group of social services representatives dragged her from the cafeteria, the school principal and superintendent following grimly behind. No one knows the particulars, not exactly, but the general consensus of the story was that she was deemed a danger to herself and to others, and thus was sent away for a two-week stint in some inpatient clinic close to the coast. Finnick thinks of that moment now, how time seemed to stop as she let them drag her from her chair, her bottle of water falling with diamond grace to the floor, leaving a trail of crystalline rain behind it. He stopped a story of his mid-sentence to watch as four hands pulled her from the room, his eyes joining the hundreds of others watching in complete awe. Finnick recalls with a shiver that she did not fight them. She bowed her head and let them lead her on. It was the look of defeat.

"Would you be willing to help her? I know you're terribly busy, but I know you're up for a challenge."

Finnick doesn't know why he says yes, but the next thing he knows, it's a week later and he's waiting for her in the library like some junior high kid waiting for a girl outside of the movies. He taps his pen against his notebook anxiously, fighting the urge to bite at his well-kept nails. Words fly around his head, words from the teachers and students alike who warned him against this moment.

_What if she gets violent on you? _

_What if she does something really insane, like throws her shit at the wall? _

_You're in over your head, Finnick. _

_ You have no idea how to handle a crazy person, not one like her. _

_They should have left her in that hospital. Maybe they'll send her back. _

_You should make her do something crazy so they'll send her back. _

_Don't you think she's a little dangerous? _

Against his will, inklings of fear begin to rise in him and the desire to flee before she arrives swells in his chest. After all, he's never talked to her before; he honestly couldn't have pointed her out in a crowd until a few weeks ago. But if the popular account is that she's as crazy as all that, then perhaps it would be best if he just left. Maybe it would be safer. Maybe things would be simpler if she just failed out of school and he stayed in his lane, continued on his path of uninterrupted coolness, of unbridled success and notoriety.

For some reason, though, he stays rooted to his chair. The clock ticks on the wall and he checks the slip of paper given to him by his teacher. Yes, this is the correct time and location, he confirms.

But, as it turns out, his worrying is for nothing. Because Annie never shows.

* * *

><p>For the next twenty-four hours, he turns it over and over in his mind. His sleep suffers from the attention he pays to her avoidance of him; it consumes him. No one stands him up; no one has before, at least. And who is she to ignore him? Nothing but some crazy, lonely girl that he had the <em>decency<em> to help. The louder parts of his mind rattle off reason after reason as to why he is justified in his feeling of insult.

On the other hand, a quieter, much smaller portion of his brain mutters half a dozen defenses of her. Powerful, defenses, but fewer all the same, and thus he chooses to ignore them, even the next morning, as he flashes his winning smile at the school's receptionist until she gives him Annie Cresta's locker number. He promises that, no, he isn't intending to do anything cruel to the girl, and then walks toward his goal with a swagger that might have looked ridiculous on any man but him.

He breathes in confidence and self-righteousness at her absence the day before swirls in his mind. His steps bounce and his chin is high. He feels no trepidation, no hesitance.

That is, until he sees her locker. Angry red sharpie marks its territory, screaming "**CRAZY CRESTA**" over and over again until the metallic silver is no longer visible at a passing glance. Finnick's stomach drops to his feet at the vandalism obviously perpetrated some time ago; the permanent marker has set and it's set for good. No attempts have been made to erase the words, not that he can see at least. He stares at those pen stains, even as bodies pass him, even as people try to speak to him as they skirt down the hallway toward homeroom. It isn't so much the cruelty of the words, of the action, that makes him pause, that makes him feel as if someone has broken him in half with one solid blow to the stomach, but it's the realization that Annie Cresta, Crazy Cresta herself, has made no action to try and erase the words. She's accepted them.

The realization fills his mouth with the acrid taste of blood as he bites down too hard on the inside of his lip.

When Annie finally arrives at her locker, the young man watches her from his place across the hall as she slowly, carefully, turns the combination of her lock. The rich red tattoos on her locker reflect angrily on her skin; Finnick suddenly feels queasy. Watching her now, there isn't anything remotely deranged about her. There's just something immaterial about her, as if she would simply dissolve into the air if she were given the chance. Finnick watches from the sidelines of her world for a stretch of time incalculable to his distracted mind, entranced by the quiet motions of the body she is trying so desperately to make small and invisible. But he sees her, and he sees her more clearly now than he's perhaps ever seen a person before.

She begins to leave her locker and Finnick's trance is broken.

"Hey!"

The word comes out of his mouth before he gives it permission to do so. But all at once his body is blocking her path down the hall and he has her attention. Confronted so directly with another human being, Annie retreats further and further into herself. Finnick tries to regain his composure, but stumbles on the way under the blank, detached and unabashed stare that she fixes on him.

"Hey-hi- Hi. I'm Finnick."

She makes no motion to speak or acknowledge his words. Her expression doesn't change. But Finnick notices that her hands are shaking as they desperately press her notebook against her chest. He softens his tone in an attempt to help, but fears that nothing he could do or say could make the tremors of her bones go away.

"I'm tutoring you in History," he gently reminds her.

Again, no recognition or acknowledgement. She stares and tries to hide how fast her heart is beating. Finnick smiles tightly and rubs a hand across the back of his neck, trying to win her over with some unspoken language that neither of them quite understand.

"We were supposed to meet yesterday, but I guess our wires got crossed or something," he says, trying to explain the situation away, but she cuts him off.

"No, they didn't."

It is as resolute as a bullet shooting out of a gun. No room for argument. No nervous stutter. No uncertain waver in tone. It is as sure and as certain as if she were giving her name and birthday. Finnick falters.

"What?" He asks, not entirely sure he understands her right.

Her voice is quiet, hardly audible against the echoing walls of the high school hallway, but it is sure, and the young man across from her hears it all the same.

"Our wires didn't get crossed," she states.

Finnick tries to process, but looses his mental footing and has to ask for a hand up.

"Did I miss something?" He asks, his eyes narrowing slightly even as his smile remains painted in place.

This is the part that Annie dreads. Her greatest dishonor has always been telling people that she knows they don't like her company. She may be crazy, but she isn't stupid enough to think anyone could want to be around her, and it is thinking about moments like this one that often cause Annie to cry without warning. She looks at the floor.

"I wasn't going to make you suffer," she says, her voice faltering for the first time as a wry smile tugs at each side of her lips.

A knot begins folding in Finnick's stomach.

"What do you mean?" He asks.

Annie's mouth dries and she hugs her books tighter into her body as if they were protecting her from the trauma of the outside world. The young man standing before her notes that she has the unique ability to be engaged with him and yet somehow immeasurably distant from him all at once.

"I wasn't going to make you spend two hours a week with Crazy Cresta," she says.

He tries to come to the defense of both of their honors, protestations rising in his throat at accusations that had not been made.

"I- I don't know what you're-"

But Annie isn't interested in his protests. She just wants to release him from whatever obligation he seems to think he's under. No one should have to suffer her. That's what she thinks.

"I'd rather fail History than make anyone be around me, you know?"

There isn't anything so bitter-tasting as defeat. Or, at least, that's what Finnick thought before this moment. What he knows now that he didn't know before was that it isn't defeat that's so bitter. It's watching someone feel like they deserve defeat.

Finnick remembers sitting in the library, alone, yesterday, stewing in his anger at her not showing up. Oh, how he wanted to hate her. How he wanted to think her crazy and how he wanted to despise her for wasting his time, for insulting his pride.

But now, he can find no room in his corner of the universe to reproach her. Now, he feels such pity for her. Now, he feels like he's finally staring at Annie Cresta, not the walking rumor of her, not the idea of her. But _actually_ her.

And now, all he wants to do is fight by her side.

The emotions playing obvious patterns across his face, Annie takes notice. She begins to push past him.

"Smile. I'm letting you off the hook," she says.

She only makes it two or three steps more before his voice reaches her once more.

"What if I don't want to be off the hook?" He asks.

It would have been so easy to walk away before he said that. But now, Annie turns, her eyes cautious and her soul locked far from him.

"What?" She replies.

Finnick crosses the space between them until he's in front of her once more. People passing by them watch with curious gazes, and he knows that this will be all anyone talks about for the near future: him talking to crazy Cresta in the hallway without any hint of malice or irony. It's sure to cause a great deal of disagreeable talk, but Finnick doesn't care.

"I don't want to be off the hook," he rephrases, knowing somehow in his angsty, teenage heart that it has to be true.

Annie shakes her head, wondering why he didn't take the out when he had the chance. Surely, he's heard about her. Surely, he knows what people say and what has happened to her. She remembers seeing him the day that they took her out of the cafeteria to bring her to the psych ward. How could he possibly want to be around her?

"You don't know what you're talking about," she says, surmising that he simply must not understand the danger, must not understand how truly far gone she is.

Instead of answering her question, Finnick points back towards her locker, towards the graffiti crying out indecencies against her.

"Why haven't you gotten that washed off yet?" He asks, the question gnawing at his stomach.

The question lands on Annie for an unsettling stretch of time. She stares at him with that drawn, unfiltered look in her eye for so long that Finnick fears she's gone off somewhere he cannot retrieve her from. But, eventually, she blinks a few times, holding a memory at bay, and returns to reality. She shrugs, but only slightly.

"You can't keep people from saying things that are true, can you?" Annie asks.

Finnick's response would have been a lie three minutes ago, but now feels as truthful to him as any prayer he's ever uttered in his life.

"I don't think it's true," he replies.

The shrill ring of the bell pierces the walls of the school and the pair of them begin moving with the crowds meandering to class.

"That makes one of us."

Nervously, one of Annie's shaking hands reaches into her pocket and pulls out a small length of rope, no longer than the length of one of her fingers, and she begins tugging and twisting it, knotting and unknotting it again under Finnick's careful gaze.

"What's that?" He asks.

Annie looks up, as if she'd forgotten his presence. Suddenly embarrassed, she flushes and shakes her head.

"It's stupid," she says, brushing off the question.

Finnick chuckles, his eyes lighting up as he looks down at the well-worn down knot in her hand.

"I didn't ask if it was stupid. I asked what it was," he teases.

Considering him for a long moment, Annie wonders if he's ready for the truth. If he's ready to know just how crazy she is. If he's ready to know that it's one of her most nervous of ticks, that she can't have her hands still for too long or they'll start doing destructive things to her own body.

She decides that that is a topic too heavy for eight fifteen in the morning, and allows a lie to come to her as easily as exhaling.

"It's for luck. I tie it for luck," she says.

Finnick reads the lie almost immediately. But he plays along.

"You're better than me," he says with a smile and a shrug, "I have the worst luck."

Part of Annie thinks to ignore him, to disengage. But she doesn't. She thinks of the little kindness that he paid her by saying she wasn't crazy. And she decides to repay the kindness in her own way. Smiling down at the cheap tiles that they're walking down, Annie gives a shrug of her own.

"Maybe your luck is changing, Finnick."

It is the first time she's said his name, and Finnick's world pauses for a half-second on its axis. There's something so gentle, so delicate about the way the two syllables that have always denoted his existence sound on her tongue. It's as if he's hearing the word for the first time and realizing that its his own; it's as if no one on Earth has ever spoken before, and the silence of the Earth is suddenly shattered by her speaking him into existence.

It's overwhelming.

Finnick spares a glance her way as they're walking and realizes that she's right. But not for the reasons she's probably thinking.

"Yeah. Maybe."

* * *

><p><strong>So, yes! I know I have a billion other stories to be working on right now (I AM getting to them, I promise!), but I'm beta for Jennycaakes' Under the Same Sun (which is fantastic, by the way!) and was so drawn into her characterization of Annie and Finnick that I had to write something about it! I hope you all enjoy! Please review!<strong>


	2. Chapter 2

_"He hopes despite despair, but it's him who needs a prayer._

_He's living with the dead._

_He's so cool. He's so tough._

_He'd bet his life on tomorrow._

_But doesn't he know life is nothing but sorrow?"_

* * *

><p>Annie Cresta isn't entirely sure that she's accepted the inevitability of living. For so long, every motion she made, every breath she drew into her lungs, was apart of a string of necessary actions that would eventually lead her to the cool embrace of oblivion. For so long, she was so prepared for her life to end that living wasn't exactly on her radar. Living, the motions of day-to-day life, wasn't a gift so much as it was a roadblock.<p>

And now, things are…different. Not better. Not exactly. Maybe she'll never be better. But she's trying. Trying to live.

This is a realization that strikes her squarely between the eyes as she sits in her last period class, waiting to meet Finnick for a make-up study session that her history teacher arranged with him. All day, her mind has been a flurry of confused rollercoaster twirls and tilts as she tries to piece together just what happened with him this morning.

He cornered her in the hallway and acted…kind enough to her. It isn't much by way of a gesture, nor is it something that any normal person would consider extraordinary.

But Annie Cresta hasn't been paid many kindnesses by this world or its people. Especially not by people like Finnick. And so she spends the rest of the day in troubled thought, in concerned thought, in secretly hopeful thought as her mind and soul are caught somewhere between the land of the living and the quiet march of one who has condemned herself to death.

_Is he making fun of me and I am just too delusional to see it? What if I made the whole thing up in my head? What if Finnick has never spoken to me at all and I'm just…crazier than I ever thought? What if he is doing this because feels sorry for me? What if he's playing some sort of trick on me? He couldn't possibly want to be around me. Not for real. Not for real. You aren't good enough for anyone's time, Annie. Especially not for a guy like Finnick. Don't be stupid. Don't be stupid. _

Those angry, bitter voices creep in between her ears, grinding any hopeful whisper in the back of her mind that he might have spoken to her for all of the right reasons into dust as she trudges to her locker.

Class has been over for some time now. She sat in her desk in her last period class long after the dismissal bell rang, pretending to read something as students bolted from the room and her teacher shuffled papers and pretended not to be concerned at the distant look in Annie's downturned eyes. Annie prefers the halls when they are empty. The fewer eyes around her, the fewer eyes she feels are judging her, hating her, wishing she would disappear. When she is the only one walking the lonely halls, her own eyes are the only ones that can do that.

So, she waits out the crowds and when she is certain they have dissolved into the quiet obscurity of their own lives, she braves the hallways, wanting nothing more than to return to her own house and fall asleep in her favorite arm chair and forget that this day, that whatever that whole Finnick Odair thing was, will be forgotten and erased from her memory by morning.

She stands outside of the doors of the library for a few minutes. Truly, she tries to muster up the courage to just take the step inside. _Thisissomekindofjokethereisnowayfinnickwouldwillinglyspendtimewithyouyoushouldknowbetteranniedontbestupidbeseriousthiscouldn'tberealwhatsortofpersonwouldwanttospendtimewithsomeonelikeyouhehasplentyofsaneandnormalfriendsyoucan'tevenmakeitthroughthedaywithoutanepisodeandyouthinkhesgoingtowillinglyspendafewhourswithyouyouareworthlessandyoudonthaveaclueyoushouldgohomeandhopeheneverwasteshistimeonyouagain..._

Tomorrow will be better, she tries to convince herself. Tomorrow will be better.

But tears slide down her cheeks and the racket in her mind deafens her to any hope of saving tonight. She turns away from the library door and starts home. Tomorrow will be better. Tomorrow will be better.

* * *

><p>Finnick waits at the library until they close. If the spines of the books surrounding him could talk, they would speak volumes worth on the sadness in his eyes when he realizes she is not coming. And they would speak tomes on the determined look he draws upon himself when he finally gathers the strength to leave the building.<p>

* * *

><p>The next morning, the Finnick Odair situation is not forgotten to Annie, but she drags herself out of bed and makes the long, solemn walk to school on her own, stepping into the front door with tender, nervous steps as she does every morning, which is victory enough for her. Anxiously, she walks toward her locker, playing with her small rope keychain, rubbing it between her thumb and forefinger until the skin is raw. Annie walks and walks, tracing the familiar path to her locker, waiting for those familiar jagged words drawn on her locker to flag her down and remind her that it is hers.<p>

Keeping her head bowed to the ground and her eyes not leaving the cheap linoleum, she walks the same thirty-seven steps from the entrance to the building to her locker, her feet laying in the same patterns it has walked all year. Her muscle memory takes her to her locker, where she turns toward the metal monstrosity and looks up for the first time since leaving her house. What she finds makes her think she has walked into a dream.

Her locker has been painted.

Her locker has been painted.

Her locker has been painted. She looks up at the silver square bearing her lock proudly, and she breathes in lungs full of air. She can smell dizzying scent of fresh fumes. Annie's eyes furrow and she leans in closer, scrutinizing the smooth surface as if waiting for the graffiti of slurs and insults that only yesterday screamed out at her to come popping out from behind the new facade. There is not one "crazy Cresta" scribble, not one "you should have tried harder" scrawl. Her locker looks just like everyone else's.

It's a small comfort. It isn't much, really. But...

But it is _a_ comfort all the same. It is _something _all the same.

People stare as they pass her, watching the crazy girl stare at her locker as though it would open up and reveal the secrets of the universe. No one will ever know, no one will ever understand what this moment means to Annie. And Annie is alright with that. This is something, a secret and small victory, that she will hold to herself so it can never be corrupted. A moment for her and no one else. She smiles. A real smile. A lightness caresses her bones. Looking at her locker, a locker that has been fixed by someone, a locker that proves that _someone is looking out for her_, is the equivalent of a full night's sleep. Looking at it is a deep breath.

Annie could have stood there for an eternity. If she had her way, she would live in that moment forever, looking up at a fresh start, a new beginning. But then, those voices come into her head like wicked eels. _Who would do this for you? What's the angle? Is someone trying to trick you?_

It doesn't take much for Annie to succumb to the sounds of those questions. Suddenly feeling very stupid indeed for not considering that this could be a mean trick sooner, she frantically turns her head over her left shoulder, looking for who it is. What gaggle of boys are waiting for her to open her locker and get a face full of mud or a hundred letters detailing how she should have tried harder to kill herself? But on her left, no one is looking at her. No one waiting for her to fall into whatever trap she imagines she's falling into.

Then, she turns to her right.

Standing further down the hall, waiting against the opposite wall, Finnick stands, looking-without reservation- squarely at her. One hand holding onto the strap of the black backpack slung over his shoulder, the fingers of his other hand shoved in his pocket, the young man looks at her with an expression she can only describe as uncertain. Annie can almost envision clouds from a storm that may never come brewing around his head, swirling in circles like a crown of unfulfilled possibility. She knows he must have done it. He must have gotten the graffiti covered.

Finnick is holding his breath, though Annie can't see that, waiting for her reaction. It wasn't difficult to get the locker painted. A few words and smiles planted in the right places in the front office and suddenly all traces of the Crazy Cresta graffiti is gone. After her blowing him off again the night before, there was a weight in his chest that he knew he could not rid himself of until he figured out a way to show her that she was worth the trouble. That she isn't just the crazy girl.

He isn't sure the message has landed when she wades through the sea of students' bodies to meet him across the hall. One of her hands is frantically rubbing that key chain of hers and the other is folded across her chest, and she stares down at the floor. She musters up all of her bravery to speak; it is a feat that seemed so easy yesterday but now feels monumentally out of her depth. Finnick holds his breath once more, waiting for her to say something that will either hurt or reassure him. When she finally finds the tongue to mutter out words, he barely catches them.

"Thank you," she whispers.

It isn't enough for what he's done for her, she thinks. But it's all she has to offer him right now. It is as much as her fragile spirit will allow for at the moment. Finnick struggles with the concept of her gratitude. It's something that should have been done long before now. Something that someone should have stepped up and done for her long ago.

"For what?" Finnick replies, not realizing the implication of such a question.

Annie's head snaps up from the floor as she believes she's made some sort of mistake. Anxiety shakes her until an apology falls out and she tries to turn her back and walk away.

"Uh- Nothing. Nothing. It was stupid," she says, gulping hard before turning on her heel, "I'm sorry."

It isn't like Finnick to let her run away-not so easily. Digging into his pocket, he produces a pack of white square cards with perfectly inked information on them, bound by a rubber band. He steps easily in front of Annie's retreating body and offers them to her. He wants to... He is trying to... Well, if someone would ask him right now why he is making such an effort, he would probably have to say that he's doing this because he went to sleep last night thinking of how long this girl must have been feeling like this, and how long he has walked the same halls as her without ever doing something about it. He would say something about making up for lost time. He sighs and holds out the cards for her to take, not taking stock of his emotions, not wondering why in the world he's going to the trouble for someone who might be beyond his help.

"Listen, I found these in my room yesterday. History flash cards," he explains, his eyes softening as her fingers uncurl from their shaking grip on the strap of her bag and taking the cards from him, "Thought they might help you out?"

"Yeah. Thanks," she says, nodding once.

"And Annie?" Finnick prods.

She acknowledges him by turning those abrupt eyes upon him. And he smiles.

"I like hanging out at the library. Maybe I'll see you around there some time?"

He walks away with a casual grace, and Annie can only think to herself... _Tomorrow is better. _


End file.
